


paper hearts

by Adara_Rose



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-War, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:07:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24577318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adara_Rose/pseuds/Adara_Rose
Summary: He remembers how Steve had beamed at him when he promised that he was gonna win him one of those bears when they scraped together the money to go to the fair on Coney Island."You're my best guy, Stevie" he'd said, his heart in his throat.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 2
Kudos: 38





	paper hearts

He sits in the far back on the ferry as it makes its slow way across the Hudson, back towards the pier. 

  
It's late - he was lucky to catch the last one for the day - and the darkness outside the window is full of blinking neon lights. He knows this, even if he currently can't see a single one, blinded as he is by the tears that refuse to stop falling.

In his arms, he's clutching a cheap teddy bear with a paper heart in a string around its neck. It's the kind guys win at a bottle throwing stall and give to their sweethearts. On the heart, someone -not him- has written a shaky S. For Stevie.

  
They used to laugh at that, before, when it was just the two of them - and he remembers how Steve had beamed at him when he promised that he was gonna win him one of those bears when they scraped together the money to go to the fair on Coney Island.   
"You're my best guy, Stevie" he'd said, his heart in his throat.

  
The heart that throbs and aches in his chest, threatening to shatter. The one that is so sore, it keeps him up at night. When he presses his pillow to his mouth to not be heard sobbing through the thin walls of the miserable bunk house he had to move into when Steve got married and he couldn't afford rent anymore.

But what do you do with a teddy bear like that, the ones with paper hearts that you win at Coney Island, when you can't give it to your sweetheart?  
'Cause Steve ain't his sweetheart. Well, he is, but he doesn't know.

  
You can't tell a married man that you're desperately in love with him.

  
But he'd promised Steve he'd win him one of those bears.

  
And Bucky Barnes is a man who keeps his promises.


End file.
